Visited the Shrine of St John Neumann on Good Friday. Found the experience really inspiring. We came away very impressed with the Saint, esp. his incredible work for the RC Church and Catholic Schools in the States. The Shrine adjoins the imposing St Joseph Apostle Church on 5th and Girard, an easy drive from Center City. Parking is available next to the Shrine.

You'll probably have to take a taxi to get here, and you'll probably have to call for a taxi to get back to wherever you're staying. So have a taxi's phone number ready. This isn't the best part of town, but it's probably not the worst either. There's a flower shop across the street where they seem to have a good sense of humor. :)

You can get a good picture of the church from across the street. You have to enter from the side of the church. There is a ramp inside which is nice for older people. Considering how big the church looked like from the outside, I was surprised that the ceiling was as low as it was. The columns inside are wood, and they aren't what you'd expect after seeing the outside. The stained glass windows were pretty. The skeleton of St. John Neumann is inside of a form of his body which is in a glass case under the altar. It looked so real that my mom thought it was actually him, but it's not. His bones are just inside of the mask and body form.

To the left of the altar is a part of his bone in a monstrance and a place to kneel in veneration. There is a place to write your prayer requests and put them inside of the little altar under the monstrance.

There is a little gift shop where you can pick up some good books on St. John, among other things, to the right of the church.

I am glad I made the trip out there. It's not quite as grand on the inside as I expected a shrine to be, but it was very nice. There is some nice art work there.